


help me please, i need you

by brontidepng



Category: The Fosters (TV 2013)
Genre: Aftermath from the Nick event, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Between Emma and Mariana POV, F/F, Falling In Love, Guilt, Not Canon Compliant, Search, Stress, Trauma, fight, once again idk what im doing, scared
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-06
Updated: 2019-05-06
Packaged: 2020-02-26 13:18:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18717856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brontidepng/pseuds/brontidepng
Summary: It's always been there, this thing between them. But they've never realised it. They couldn't, not really; with Jesus loving Emma, and their Best-Friend-Foreverness, it's not something they're allowed to notice. But then, Nick comes along and scares the both of them, scares them so much that Emma and Mariana really can't ignore it, their feelings, not anymore.// Emma searches for Mariana, and then there was a realisation of feelings. Also Nick, he's an asshole for scaring Mariana.





	1. He's here

Mariana looked around erratically, and all she could see were glimpses of Nick. Flashes of him, there, and then gone. Beads of sweat started to collect on her forehead, and her shirt was sticking to her with dampness. She’s terrified. Her hands trembled, and her body filled with jitters, and she took her hands together to try and still the fear in them, unsuccessful.

She needed to leave, to get away from him. Mariana doesn’t want to get hurt. Nick will hurt her, she knows it. If not her, he’ll hurt himself, and she doesn’t think she can handle that, handle Nick hurting himself because of her.

She glanced around once more, looking for any signs of Nick Stratos. She caught a hint of his dirty blonde hair. Her heart sped up, almost causing her to double over, but her instincts forced her to turn the opposite direction. She ran.

 

She couldn’t breathe. Was that normal? Oh god, oh god, what if Nick found her? She’s not safe. Mariana clenched her hands into a fist, held her knees even closer to herself. Her head on her knees, her mind static, and full. Like hot syrup pouring down her head, filling the enclosed space that her mind was in, thick and viscous. The wind was blowing against her, but she felt even hotter than before. She tried to block it out, but every gust of wind, any little sound, caused her to become even more agitated and restless. She tried to breathe.

Nick’s going to find her if she doesn’t move. She tried but fear gripped her bones, her body rooted to the grass, stock-still. She shuddered, and began to shake, unable to stop. Hot tears found its way to the palm of her hands, as she tried to aggressively wipe them away. This won’t help her… Please someone help, Mariana whispered into the wind. She wanted to see Emma, her family, anyone who’s familiar.

 

But then Nick found her.

 

~~

 

Emma was having fun. It felt good helping a cause; one as important as this. Although, not a lot of people were actually willing to help; and those who were, they signed her clipboard with a petition that was barely filled out. Emma was not put off, it was only midday and the Bayfest festival wasn’t busy at this particular area, not yet at least. As she was ignored by yet another person, Jesus slipped next to her and placed an arm around her shoulder. She tensed.

It’s just… Emma didn’t want this anymore, this familiarity with Jesus. Not that she doesn’t want to be friends with him, but she knows he still has feelings for her. She didn’t want to change this ‘friends with benefits’ deal, but ever since Jesus wanted more than that with her, she wasn’t comfortable having any sort of deal with him anymore. She’s dealing with her own sort of issues, and dredging up the heartbreak from their former relationship was definitely not something she had in mind that day.

And in all honesty, she wanted to hang out with a specific person, and Jesus was definitely not the twin she was looking for.

Although... Emma hasn’t seen Mariana anywhere. Disappointed, she resigned to the fate of handling this interaction with Jesus.

“Hey,” she stretched out the word, slinking away from his touch, and facing him. “How’ve you been, Jesus?”

He looked disheartened, but quickly schooled his expression to a happier tone. “Good, pretty good considering the nail in my head.”

She winced from the memory of Jesus in the hospital bed, she could hardly imagine the idea of a nail in someone’s head, let alone in Jesus’ head. She gave an awkward chuckle. “Oh right. I, uh, I’m sorry I left early. I had a family thing I couldn’t avoid,” she lied. “I thought they took the nail out. Are you okay?”

“Yea, they did. Still wasn’t a fun thing, blacking out, and I have these massive headaches now. But, you know, I’m a lot better now, Em.” He said in his low voice, shrugged his broad shoulders, and giving her an intense look. “Went to look for you after the robot comp, but you weren’t there. Got scared of crazy Mariana?” He had a tilt of a grin to his face.

She shrugged. She was hoping he wouldn’t bring that up. She had left the team celebrations soon afterward, not wanting to talk to either of the twins: extremely frustrated at Mariana’s overbearing leadership, plus a desperate need to avoid Jesus’ attention.

“Look Emma, we should talk about this,” he gestured between them, with hope in his eyes, “talk about us.”

An awkward pause.

“There is no... _us_ , Jesus... I’m sorry,” she shook her head gingerly, “I just can’t handle this. You wanting something more of me is not something I want for myself.”

“Okay okay wait. Then let’s just go back. Just forget what I said. Please, we can just do the ‘benefits’ thing, okay?”

“That’s the thing, I don’t think we can.”

“What do you mean? It’s just sex, Emma, come on. Think about this. Didn’t we have fun? You enjoyed it as much as I did.”

She sighed, regretting this conversation. “It’s not just that anymore, you know that. Jesus, you still have feelings for me; feelings I don’t have.”

His look hardened. “Don’t be so full of yourself,” he huffed out angrily, not caring of any spectators to this argument, “It’s just sex!”

“Jesus - “ she softly said.

“It’s just what?” Stef asked, startling both of them out of their tense fight. They both looked at each other, then straightened themselves towards Stef. Stef looked confused, and Emma relaxed a little, hoping that Jesus’ mom didn’t hear the tail end of his rant. She loosened her grip on her clipboard, and positioned her arms behind her back, standing straighter and fixing her posture. Being in the wrestling team for such a long time had meant training herself to have better posture, to reduce any unnecessary strain on her body so it didn’t affect her in-game.

Her focus snapped back to Stef, her hearing caught up with her brain, as Stef asked, an anxious look to her face, “Hey loves, have you guys seen Mariana around? I haven’t been able to find her around this area.”

Emma scanned around, and wondered where Mariana was. She’d thought she would have seen her by now, but Mariana’s lack of appearance was not an uncommon thing. Emma had been kinda avoiding her after the aftermath of Mariana’s rampage during the robot competition. But she didn’t want to avoid her forever. She noticed the change in Mariana ever since the ordeal with the school. Her wariness around everything, jumping at the slightest sound, bags under her eyes, her bloodshot eyes. She could see how tired Mariana was, and the robot competition certainly didn’t help the situation. The traumatic event at school coupled with the stress of the competition left Mariana extremely high-strung, and Emma suddenly became very worried.

 _But not worried enough to notice her gone,_ Emma internally scolded herself. She felt guilty.

Jesus was talking, but she paid no attention, her mind whirring at full speed. She couldn't believe herself, how she had let her frustrations control her, and now nobody knew where Mariana could be. But Mariana was probably fine. The Bayfest area was not insanely big, so going on a search wouldn’t be a problem. She breathed in, holding it, then exhaled slowly. She repeated the process. She’s sure Mariana was fine. She had to be. Mariana’s not stupid, she wouldn’t wander off. She was probably getting a lot more signatures in another area than what Emma was currently getting. Mariana could do a lot, when she put her mind to it. But... something felt wrong; the feeling in her heart was contradicting her hopeful thoughts.

“...said something about seeing Nick. She didn’t look too good. I didn’t know if she was being paranoid or something.”

She snapped back to reality, when she heard Nick’s name.

“Nick? What about him? Did he get out? What do you mean ‘seeing Nick’?“ Emma rushed out, growing increasingly agitated, high-pitched. She started pacing.

“I dunno, she said she saw Nick, but he’s stuck at his house with an ankle monitor. If he got out, my moms would know, and we would too,” explained Jesus.

Stef chimed in, a sweet low tone, placing a hand on Emma’s shoulder as an attempt to calm her, “We would, love, but not if he somehow removed it. I’ve had rare cases of people carefully cutting off their ankle monitors, and slipping from house arrest. We can never be too careful. I’ll give his guards a call.” She went off, with her phone in hand.

“Well, the last time I saw her, she was walking towards the street, towards the long walkway between the road and the pier. I just thought she was going to the bathroom or something.”

“Oh my god, Jesus, what the hell? She was talking about Nick, you knew how scared she is of him, why didn’t you stay with her? She’s probably terrified,” Emma hissed, annoyance and fear spilling out of mouth. Jesus looked baffled.

She started towards the bathroom, with a desperate intent on finding Mariana before anything could happen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i wrote more but still dunno how to write. oopsie, also i dont think its super ooc although i dont really remember emma ever getting super mad.
> 
> ive always loved reading canon-compliant/canon-divergent fics, i really love it when authors delve deep and write about how certain situations affected the characters, its just so fascinating to me. thats kinda why i wanted to start writing, bc there might be some story that nobody has written, and im always just day-dreaming about what would happen if certain things happened. so why not write?


	2. Where is she?

Was it guilt? Guilt that spurred her on her frantic search for her best friend?

A little bit of that, she guesses.

Or maybe obligation. Mariana is Jesus’ twin sister, and Emma was once in love with him (she's not sure if it was even  _love_ ). Turning her back on Mariana would be like turning her back on Jesus, and despite his feelings, she wouldn’t deliberately do anything that would hurt him... or his sister.

What about this feeling in her gut, crawling up to her chest, her heart, her throat? It had always felt like fluttering, not so overbearing, but noticeable. Now it feels like its twisting and wrenching something out of her, feels worse than before, but she doesn’t know what’s there that makes her feel this. It feels even worse when she realises she can’t find Mariana.

Emma grips the steering wheels, and with Jesus in the back and Jesus’ mom in the passenger seat, she drives further up the street, eyes scanning the vacant road, and pathway, and park, and whatever’s in front of her, eyes focusing for black hair, and the same red shirt that the Adams Foster family had on, the same shirt she’s wearing right now. Nick’s out. He escaped, and her feelings of worry, of utter fear fills every inch of her body.

She tries to be logical about this. Mariana has two feet, and is quite athletic, evident from her days in dancing; and Emma had always admired her toned arms and legs, especially loves it when her shirt rides up, or whenever she shows off a little bit of skin. Not that she would say anything about that to anyone, she doesn’t think it’s normal to think about her best friend in that way. Emma had always said about her not wanting sexiness to define herself. But it is such a good look for Mariana; it is something she found that she loves about Mariana.

 _Emma, focus!_ she thinks harshly. _Now’s not the time for this emotional feelings bullshit._ What was she thinking about? Mariana’s feet. Focus on Mariana’s feet, wait not her feet, her athleticism, right, Mariana is fit, she could run pretty far. Emma’s hoping she didn’t run. It would make finding her a lot harder.

She spots a couple up on the grass, next to the road, and feels a kind of emptiness. No, it’s more of a longing. Of what, she’s not sure. But wait. There’s something familiar about this guy; he’s hovering over the girl, gesturing with his arms, touching his hair, his side, and almost touches the girl, hesitantly. The girl. She’s cowering, afraid. He needs to stop scaring her. So she stops the car.

 

~~

 

He’s here. Nick found her. And she doesn’t feel anything about it. She resigns herself to her fate.

 

And then he’s gone. A flash, lots of grunts, and screaming.

 

She can’t think, she can’t see. It’s fuzzy, clouded. She thinks it’s the adrenaline in her blood, coursing through her system; or maybe it's the ADHD pills she swiped from Jesus' stash. But then she feels arms around her body. And she tenses again, her body terrified, and more and more tears stream down her face, she can’t stop her body quivering, and she's trying to get away, pushes hard against the other person. She’s sobbing, and it hurts.

The hands become gentle, almost disappears, but they tilt her head upwards, thumbs brushing away her tears; and then there are soft caresses, soft words, soft kisses. She barely registers them, so tender as they are, and it… it makes her feel calmer, more anxious than frightened, wrapped in a sense of safety.

Mariana looks through her tears, still gathering in her eyes, and blurring her vision. She sees brown hair, not dark but light and she thinks, _Wait... I know her. I love her. She heard me! Oh thank god, she heard me and she’s here._


	3. What happens now?

Emma finds herself in a tough position. She doesn’t want to hurt Jesus anymore that she has. He has TBI now, and he needs their support. But the way they ended things back at Bayfest makes her hesitate. Which means she’s avoiding him. She knows it’s a shitty move, and it makes her a shitty friend but she can’t. She just can’t. She has more recurring nightmares than usual; about how Jesus fell hard and unconscious after Nick had punched him, how it could have left him sleeping forever and ever; and sometimes about Mariana, about what would have happened if Emma didn’t find her. It was sometimes a mixture of both, and it was indescribably painful for her to witness over and over again.

And sometimes, her nightmares were more of a memory, less painful and more dream-like, sweet and soft. She dreams about finding Mariana, and holding her, trying to keep her together, gathering her fallen pieces, and wiping away her tears. Touching her oh so gently, murmuring words of promise, of ‘it’s okay’ and 'I'm here', and kissing Mariana on her forehead, on her cheek, on her nose, on her soft lips; and it left her gasping and tired and guilty.

She doesn’t want to hurt Jesus but she can’t help herself this time.

Because now, whenever she’s with Mariana, she looks at Emma, like she realised something. It makes that feeling in her stomach, her chest, her heart, her throat worsen whenever Mariana looks at her, even when they’re sitting side by side during lunch at school in their spot, a quiet spot, that’s only just for them. It gets more and more intense, and Emma doesn’t know what to do, thinks that maybe she should see a doctor or something.

And sometimes the feeling goes away, when Emma hides, away from Mariana. But that usually doesn’t last long, because it comes back when her thoughts are back on her best friend.

She’s never had feelings like this about anyone before. And she doesn’t know what to make of it.

 

~~

 

Emma’s been avoiding her, Mariana knows it. It hurts her feelings, but Emma’s been through a lot too, so she can’t blame her best friend for taking care of herself. She just wished that Emma would come to her, so she can help her too. She wishes…

The thing is Mariana has new found feelings about her best friend. Though, if she thinks about it, it’s always been there, just hidden away, deep in her heart. Honestly, what could she have done about it, when her best friend and her brother were tongue-deep in each other, admittedly probably in love. She can’t do anything about that, she can’t be the girl that destroys her brother’s happiness.

So she moved on like any other person, by creating a whole set of messes for herself. Screwing up her relationship with Callie, by hooking up with Wyatt. Well done, Mariana. Breaking Matt’s heart twice. 100 points to her mess-scoreboard. Becoming bitch-zilla during the robot competition, then getting kicked out by her best friend and her teammates. Call a professional cleaner, cos someone needs to help clean up her shit of a mess.

Those weeks fighting with Emma and Jesus were painful, but it certainly helped her situation of unrequited love.

Or it didn’t. Not really.

Because she remembers that day with Nick. It’s been weeks, months since it happened. She’s not stupid enough to take Jesus’ pills anymore; it caused way too much trouble, and her family can’t take any more terrible news, what with Callie’s possible imprisonment. God, she can’t think about that. It’s all her fault really, Nick getting out, hurting Jesus, Callie trying to find her in a murderer’s car. It makes her shiver. And the silent treatment from her entire family and Emma during those first few weeks after was hell, and it made her want to disappear forever.

It’s obvious that she’s a hazard, and everyone should really avoid her. But then Emma didn’t after those first few weeks. She came back and she hung out with Mariana. And Mariana got her family back somewhat, though it was more broken than whole.

And when Mariana looked (looks) at Emma, she feels even more full than before. Like a space in her heart was filled, stuffed to the brim, threatening to spill out.

Mariana wants to say something to Emma, declare her love, give up her heart. It’s sappy, and pink, with Mariana looking at Emma with those so-called rose tinted glasses. But she can’t help herself. She’s willing to wait for Emma if she has to, she’d wait for her forever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> gosh i hope you liked it, never thought id find writing as therapeutic as reading. it was a lotta fun :)

**Author's Note:**

> gosh i hope you liked it, never thought id find writing as therapeutic as reading. it was a lotta fun :)


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